Habitat and ecology: Locally abundant in sandy, disturbed soils. Also found in sand barrens and along railroads.

Occurence in the Chicago region: native

Etymology: Silene probably comes from the Greek word sialon, meaning saliva, referring to the sticky secretion on many of these plants. It may also have come from the word seilenos, referable to Silenus-a foam-covered, drunken character in Greek Mythology.

Author: The Morton Arboretum

From Flora of Indiana (1940) by Charles C. Deam

This species is variable. It prefers a very sandy habitat and is frequent in railroad ballast throughout the state. It is less frequent in fallow and cultivated fields, pastures, and waste places and along roadsides. Our manuals give this species as a native of the United States. I do not believe, however, that it was a native of Indiana. Our earliest authors either do not list it or give it as a plant of waste places. M'Murtrie, who published a flora of Louisville in 1819, does not list it, nor does Riddell, who published his "Flora of the Western States" in 1835. Short, Peter & Griswold published a catalogue of the plants of Kentucky in 1833, and they do not list it. Neither do they list it in any of their four supplements, the last published in 1840. Lapham lists it from Illinois in his flora published in 1857. Dr. Clapp records that he found it in 1835 east of Corydon and in the "barrens." Young, in his catalogue of the plants of Jefferson County published in 1871, does not list it. J. M. Coulter, however, reports it in his catalogue published four years later. Schneck, who published a flora of the Lower Wabash Valley in 1876, says: "In poor grounds anong cereals, common." Bradner, Phinney, and Van Gorder did not report it in their floras. Apparently it has become a frequent weed during the past 50 years. I believe it has been introduced mostly in grass and grain seed and by railroads. A form with the internodes lacking the glutinous band is known as f. deaneana Fern. It occurs with the species and I found it in Posey County associated with the species and the variety [var. divaricata]. [Variety divaricata, a taxon with thinner leaves and more widely spreading inflorescence,] has been reported from the dune area by Peattie. Evidently local and rare in the state. I have it from Kosciusko and Warrick Counties.

Duration: Annual Nativity: Native Lifeform: Forb/Herb General: Annual herb, to 80 cm tall, from a slender taproot; stems slender and erect, sparingly branched or unbranched, mostly glabrous, with sticky brown or red bands on the upper portions of the stems. Leaves: Opposite and sessile along the stems; blades linear to oblong-lanceolate, 2-5 cm long and 2-12 mm wide; basal leaves often have ciliolate margins, especially near the leaf bases. Flowers: Pink to white, in diffuse terminal panicles, on slender pedicels 1-3 cm long; sepals 5, united into a subcylindric tube, 6-7 mm long in flower, expanding to be 7-9 mm long and ovoid in fruit, prominently 10-nerved, and topped with 1 mm long teeth; petals 5, exceeding calyx teeth about 1 mm, white, bright pink, or tipped with deep rose, each petal shallowly cleft into 2 lobes at the tip. Fruits: Capsules 6-8 mm long, ovoid, about the same length as the calyx, splitting open by 6 short teeth; containing many tiny light reddish-brown seeds, less than 1 mm long. Ecology: Found on open sandy hills, often in burned areas or other weedy locations, below 8,500 ft (2591 m); flowers March-May. Distribution: In every US state and the southern Canadian provinces. Ethnobotany: Unknown, but other species in the genus have uses. Etymology: Silene may refer to the mythical Silenus, the intoxicated father of Bacchus, who was described as covered in foam, perhaps alluding to the viscid nature of many species of Silene; antirrhina makes reference to Antirrhinum, the genus of cultivated snapdragons, which have similar leaves. Synonyms: Silene antirrhina var. confinis, S. antirrhina var. depauperata, S. antirrhina var. divaricata, S. antirrhina var. laevigata, S. antirrhina var. subglaber, S. antirrhina var. vaccirifolia Editor: SBuckley 2010, AHazelton 2017